1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image reproduction apparatus for reproducing medical image and to a program therefor.
2. Description of the Related Art
There have been used radiation image information recording reproducing systems employing stimulable phosphor that stores a part of energy of radiation such as X rays, α rays, β rays, γ rays, electron rays, and ultraviolet rays emitted thereon and emits light in accordance with the stored energy upon exposure to stimulating rays such as laser beams and visible lights.
Among radiation image information recording reproducing systems of this kind, a system comprising a radiation image reading apparatus, an identification information registration apparatus, and an image recording apparatus is in widespread use. In the radiation image reading apparatus, radiation image information of a patient or the like is once stored in a stimulable phosphor sheet, and the sheet is scanned with a stimulating ray such as a laser beam to cause the stimulable phosphor sheet to emit light. The emitted light is then read photoelectrically to obtain image data. Identification information of the patient is registered in the identification information registration apparatus. The image recording apparatus records a radiation image based on the image data as a visible image on a recording material such as a photosensitive material, while relating the image to the registered identification information of the patient.
In such a conventional radiation image information processing system, a radiation image is displayed on a monitor such as an LCD or CRT for viewing, upon output of a radiation image as a visible image. An image display apparatus of this type tends to be installed at each ward of a hospital, or even for each image interpreter such as a physician or technician. For this reason, not only a hard-copy image output from the system is delivered to each destination such as a ward of a hospital but also a processed radiation image having been subjected to reading, image processing, and the like by a radiation image information reading apparatus is sent to each ward as image data for viewing (display), in order to improve efficiency of diagnosis, to reduce waiting time for patients, and to speed up treatment (see U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20020060302, for example).
When a radiation image is displayed on a monitor such as an LCD or CRT, various kinds of image processing such as density adjustment processing and enhancement processing is carried out thereon so that the image can be easier to interpret for improving diagnostic performance.
However, if a subject having been graphed is a child or an infant, the contrast of a chest radiation image thereof tends to be less clear than that of a chest radiation image of an adult, due to less air content in the subject's lungs. Therefore, image processing needs to be carried out on the image by using parameters different from those for a chest radiation image of an adult. Consequently, a technician inputs information on a radiation image he/she radiographed, and an image processing apparatus carries out image processing according to the information. However, the number of items to be input is large, and troublesome operations are thus necessary. For this reason, appropriate image processing may not be carried out in some cases due to inaccurate information caused by erroneous input or input omission.